Monday, January 05, 2009

NYT not fair and balanced

Jonathan Schwarz makes the point that the New York Times is not fair and balanced when it comes to reporting on Israel and Gaza. Schwarz gives an example of how a slideshow of Israel/Palestine pictures on the NYT website misrepresents what is going on. He notes that, "During the current conflict, the ratio of dead Palestinians to dead Israelis is about 100-1." (Yet you wouldn't get that impression from the NYT slideshow, the NYT is presenting an extremely distorted picture of what Israel is doing.)

Commenting on Schwarz's blog entry, someone called "Fritz" tries to make excuses for the NYT's bias: "Maybe someone at the NY Times remembers the photos of Palestinian celebrations on 9/11."

And of course no one remembers photos of Israelis celebrating the 9/11 attacks right here in America because the media didn't publish them. A witness in New Jersey said she saw 5 Israelis (Sivan Kurzberg, Paul Kurzberg, Yaron Shmuel, Oded Ellner and Omer Marmari) taking video or photos of themselves smiling with the World Trade Center burning in the background. These men were arrested and their cameras were seized. I have seen videos and pictures seized by police shown on TV before, why not in this case? One of the photographs developed by the FBI showed Sivan Kurzberg holding a lit lighter in the foreground, with the smoldering wreckage in the background, said Steven Noah Gordon, a lawyer for the five Israelis. Why didn't the media want to show the American public the images of Israelis celebrating RIGHT HERE AMONG US? Also, why did mainstream media keep silent about it?

It took months before it was even mentioned on mainstream TV and when it finally was mentioned, the pictures of the Israelis were still not shown. When it was mentioned, it was in the context of explaining it away, they broadcast their lawyer's excuse that it was simply immaturity! No such explanation was given for the Palestinians who were for the most part literally immature because they were actually children. The Israelis were adult men here in our country. The mainstream media suppressed this story. Six months later ABC mentions it in an attempt to explain it away. The media reported the excuse given by the Israeli's lawyers which was to say it was simply immaturity! "... no one has been able to find a good explanation for why they may have been smiling with the towers of the World Trade Center burning in the background. Both the lawyers for the young men and the Israeli Embassy chalk it up to immature conduct."

A woman who watched the Israelis celebrating through binoculars said to ABC News that the men were taking video or photos of themselves with the World Trade Center burning in the background. What struck Maria were the expressions on the men's faces. "They were like happy, you know … They didn't look shocked to me. I thought it was very strange," she said.

And besides all that, Fritz's excuse does not justify the NYT bias which, as Schwarz points out, has been going on for forty years.

6 comments:

Is this what you were telling me through Email, about the five Israelis who were caught celebrating the 9/11 attacks?

It is ironic though, how censorship of Israel's crimes only causes anti-semitism. I say this because, people are starting to realize that the US media is biased towards Israel for whatever reason. Because people know this, they think the reason for such bias is because the people who control what news and facts we see are Jewish and are primarily loyal to Israel. People become angered at that and take it out on Jews thinking they are all dually-loyal. In other words, the best way to end anti-semitism would be to report Israel's crimes. If they're hidden, and the public knows it, they will assume everything I just mentioned and will start to take it out on others. Unfair reporting does no good for anyone, and this is an example.

I'll admit it openly: Some Israelis are assholes. they have poor humor. we have racists here and religious nuts too, I'm sad to say.

But unlike Hammas in Gaza, our assholes don't control the government. They don't use their children as live shields. they do not attack civilians they are supposed to serve as an elected parliament party, and they do not attack the neighboring country with missiles on civilians while that same country is sending in food and medical supplies to their citizens.

I'm sorry, you think this is unbalanced?

* The non-reporting of 5 assholes with REALLY bad taste in New Jersey who hurt a few people's feelings.

versus

* Thousands of missiles launched over 8 years at my country's civilians killing dozens and traumatizing tens of thousands of children and adults over long years, including during unilateral ceasefire, as well as ones they agreed to and didn't stick to.

I'm not really following you, can you explain how those are anywhere close to the same scale?

can you honestly tell me that McCain supporters calling Obama a terrorist are NOT assholes? Or Should I judge your papers' "balance" based on how much they reported on those assholes compared to how much they reported the bombing of Baghdad by the US Army?

Can anybody tell me why Jews from all over the world are transferred in the middle of the Arab countries?They were tortured and killed in the European countries, and it's only logical that they should be re-established where they were originally established.How can I expect to have good behaviour from you when I have tortured you and kicked you out of your own property? You will be mad for sure!

The five Israelis arrested were undercover secret agents working for Israeli secret service Massoud. The purpose of their spy operating was to investigate radical Islamic funds being operated in the United States to finance terrorism to Al-Qaida, Hamas and Hezbollah. The reason the FBI shifted the case to the CIA was for the agents not to have their cover blown. The United States of America also was working with the Israeli secret service in counter terrorism operations. The reason this is not mention in the 911 commission report is to protect middle east interests for peace. They know Palestinians were responsible and involved in influencing Al-Qaida. The United States did not want to appear bias towards Israel because they have enough problems in the middle east as it is. Blaming Palestinians would disrupt the peace process altogether. The US government knows Palestinians were celebrating the attacks of 911. The United States of America job is to protect diplomatic efforts for peace. So the fact they did not blame Palestinians was just like Obama said was to display "Mutual respect to the Muslim world". Islam is a big problem world wide and it is dangerous as a religion. So it is not just politics but also concerns regarding how dangerous Islam is. There is no proof they were dancing even the Israelis denied doing this. How come this site does not mention they arrested 100 Arabs in the process. This here is just typical Hamas Charter propaganda. Your with Israel or your with the terrorist sympathizers period. Osama Bin Laden must love this page.

OK, Messiah... when I manage to get my leadsers to sign a sustainable peace treaty I'd like to smoke some of whatever you are having...

The El-Qa'ida gang are Wahabi. They are definitely NOT influenced by a few Sunnis. I can tell you for a fact they could not care less about Sunnis killing each other. The only reason Sunnis like the Hamas and Hezbollah are getting money from the Iranian Shiites instead of waging war on each other is that Israel is still around. If there is anything that a Shiite hates more than a Sunni, it's a Jew. Then they go around calling it a religion of peace...

Now I admit I hate the fact we had to bomb the Hamas and kill civilians. I hate the fact the Hamas would not talk any reason to us no matter how much we tried and through any number of channels. their behavior defies logic, and certainly seeks to perpetuate the violence in the name of some (un)holy theistic dogma.

back to the subject: I have nothing much more to say about celebrating idiots in Jersey, I didn't even bother looking up the story. The point is that I read a few posts here and in Julia's blog as well, and annoyingly it seems you guys are completely single-sided in your arguments too. Hamas performs atrocities much worse than the Israeli army did. I'm not happy we did it the way we did and it also fealt like an elections stunt on our side. I really DO have a lot against it, and it even caused me to change my vote in 10 days' time....

However, that's not an excuse for ignoring completely what Hamas has been doing all these years and treat those assholes as freedom fighters, when they are killing and abusing Fatah's people in Gaza for the last two years much worse than what our army did there during the 3 weeks' campaign.

I wonder if your "biased" media showed also the side of the Israelis against the attacks, and the fact that Israeli Arabs who never protested the Hamas shooting Israelis, started showing up to non-violence demonstrations only after this little war started...

So if you want to point out missing details, I have many more to give you. just ask... I'm right here and I have contacts on both sides of the argument. You seem to be only representing a very narrow view and a very specific spin. that's not better than what you blame the US press for.